The first 3 metroid games(Metroid, Metroid IIsold well for a handheld game I guess, and Super Metriod) all sold very well in japan, but now it seems to me that metroid games aren't popular in japan anymore. At first I thought it was because of the new direction the series has taken into the first person perspective, but when looking at sales of Fusion you could see that it also sold poorly in japan.  Super Metroid sold about 7 times that of metroid prime, and the original was a milion seller in japan. Could it be the Hiatus that caused the disinterest or, could it be that the metroid series was already declining in japan and then the hiatus allowed for the greatest decrease? It can't be the small userbase of the GC in japan, because Metroid fusion sold only a little more than metroid prime and it was on the gba, and metroid prime 3 sold less on the Wii's userbase.

I think the original Metroid had the benefit of being one of the near launch titles of the nes. There wasn't much competition for the game at the time.

Times have changed. I'd argue they probably never really liked the idea in the first place.

FPS's don't sell particularly well in Japan.

Firstly metroid prime isn't an fps, it's an action-adventure with Fps elements. Secondly that doesn't explain Fusion's sales.

Games in First Person Perspective are not that big in Japan or maybe because its made by a western dev now?

That doesn't explain why fusion sold lower.

Okay, so let's see.

Metroid 1 - 1.04M - the 39th best selling game on NES in Japan.

Super Metroid - 0.71M - the 34th best selling game on SNES in Japan.

MP - 0.12M the 29th best selling game on GC in Japan

MP2 - 0.07M - the 31st best selling GC game in Japan

MP3 - 0.07M - so far the 13th best selling Wii game in Japan.


So my guess is as follows.

It has nothing to do with Metroid specifically.

There are many less big sellers in Japan than before. Japaneese aren't buying different games anymore, they're buying the same ones. Therefore, Metroid has now come in the "not quite good enough" basket for them, along with many other games.

Yeah I think its what you said, or what Super_etecoon said. One of those are probably why. Hopefully nintendo could make the japanese interested again.

I was found that Metroid and Mega Man had a similar platform path or at least what I remembered of them in the NES/SNES days. But one went 3d platform and the other "action adventure" shooter.

It will be interesting to see which direction they take Kid Icarus, another game of the genre. I don't think the "action adventure" doesn't work for audience of the old NES games and Japanese audience, so I would be surprise to see it go that route.

Don't worry. The Japanese don't seem to like Castlevania either.